Public Statements

Issue Position: School Bullying

Issue Position

Legislation was passed a year ago to make bullying a crime. However we have not seen much in the way of enforcement. But let's take a minute to look at the real issue of bullying. Many people think its two kids fighting in the school, then the video being posted on Youtube. This issue goes way beyond that. Not only is that one of the issue but here is how bullying really works. We have the fighting which is obvious. But what about the few students that are pressuring their peers to the point to try drugs? Is that peer pressure or are our students being bullied into trying drugs? What about the teachers? Lets explore this for a minute. Lets use an example of what might be seen as bullying. Look inside a classroom for a minute. The teacher is an early 20's teacher. She is 5 feet 5 inches tall and weighs approx. 110 pounds. Now here is the scenario. She is trying to teach her class, and through the entire lesson there is a male student who is almost 6 inches taller than her, weighs over 50 pounds more than her just heckling and disrupting the class. Her attempts to quiet the student down are uneffective and outrages the student. So what is this student really doing? He is bullying and taunting his own teacher. After doing so repeatedly, she realizes her only option is to just to try to get through that class without setting the student off. That's bullying. Now for the last scenario. Many of us have children that use Facebook. Have you looked at your child's facebook? How many many school students (girls), are getting friends requests by high school students? Innocent enough when the student feels they are going to be in school with that student in just a year or two. But what happens when that 17 year old starts asking that 12 year old girl to be sent pictures or other items via text message. The girls first response is no. But when the older student tells the younger one, he will tell everybody negative things about her in the school, she reluctantly feels threatened. So she sends what he asks for. Only to find out, the older student has now passed these things on to dozens of his friends. Not only has she been bullied by this action, but now her upcoming reputation is being damaged. If just a handful of students are able to get away with this now, how will it be in 5 or 10 years? This issue needs to be dealt with now.